We Ain't Cowards
by MadnessIsTheMurderer
Summary: She was raised a catholic girl in the middle of Texas, in a small catholic town filled to the brim with catholic people. God was something she was expected to believe in. But she murdered a man in cold blood, dead set on murdering another. Kira - God - would die at her hands, no matter what it would take. (Reposted as a new story, major rewrites done.)
1. We Ain't Cowards

_Sometimes, life can be tough._

Bitterly, Ryan remembered the words her father constantly said. He was a happy man, always willing to do what he could to make his children's lives easy. It didn't matter to him how much he had to work, if he didn't sleep for a day or two, if his body was sore all over the next day. As long as his kids were happy and had what they needed to be so, he was alright with whatever came.

She recalls, then, always thinking he was a fool. Was it really worth it, putting your own health in jeopardy because of children?

It was one of the reason she didn't want to have any herself, ever; she didn't wanted to know the answer to that selfish question.

 _But ya know what ya do, Ryan? Ya just keep on goin'. Ya keep on survivin'. What else can ya do, right? Layin' down an' givin' up? That's a coward's way. An' we ain't no cowards, are we, Ryan?_

She remembers holding his hand, looking up to him, smiling that arrogant little smile that would follow her all through her life. It would become signature to her, a cocky little grin that she'd use multiple times, over and over, making a name for herself through that distinct piece of character.

She remembers answering in her most confident tone: "No, pa, we ain't."

She was six, yet she knew who she was. She wasn't a coward, she wasn't someone who would give up. When life pushed on her, she'd push back until it broke, because Lord knew she wouldn't be the one who did.

 _That's right, darlin'. That's right._

Looking down at the body of the dead man before her now, she piles yet another shovel-full of dirt on top, questioning herself as she does.

If her father saw her now, eighteen years later standing above this dead, nameless man, would he still think it was alright not to lay down and be a coward?

Inwardly, she scoffed.

 _Yeah, pa, we ain't cowards. Think I showed him that when I put a bullet through his brain._

…

She was raised a catholic girl in the middle of Texas, in a small catholic town filled to the brim with catholic people. Real God lovers, they were, always willing to please that man in the sky with whatever sources they had. She remembers all the times they said grace around a table set for six, all the times she would halfheartedly pretend to pray to some form of deity she was quickly losing faith in.

You see, when she was seven, she stopped believing. She didn't think there was some man there, ready to save them with some tribulation of sorts. She didn't believe none of the bull the priest would spout during mass, yet she sat through them anyways, if not to just solidify her ideals of rejection. The bible was nothing more than a book of lies to her, pages filled with nothing but false-facts and misplaced idolization. If it weren't for her parents and siblings being ever-faithful servants to the Lord, she would have been out of that little town faster than they could bless her soul.

She stayed because of them, though, because they needed her. Sure, it was a small town, but it wasn't nice. Times were harsh, the people were worse. She grew to adapt as she grew up, became the strongest in that town if only in the opinions of herself. Yeah, she had lost ahold of her Lord and savior, but that didn't mean she couldn't pretend she hadn't. She still participated in whatever shindigs they chose to have in honor of their almighty Maker and whoever else they chose to praise. To her, it didn't matter who they did their mass to – it could have been the Easter bunny for all she cared – because she would just sit there without a word sinking into her closed-off mind, hearing but not believing.

It was in mass that she learned to block out others, learned to appear to listen without actually doing so. It was a trick city-folks learned quickly, something country hicks wouldn't learn until they left the comforts of their tiny towns and adventured out.

That skill would grow to be her best ally, and her greatest downfall.

…

Ryan had been the eldest of four children born to a Mr. And Mrs. Kyle and Allison Henderson. Their large family caused for an increased need for money, a need that two working parents alone couldn't fulfill.

So when her youngest brother was born a few months after her sixteenth birthday, Ryan quit the public school she went to and got a job. It didn't pay much, working as a construction worker, but it was helpful. Every two weeks she'd bring home a stack of fresh bills totaling well around the $170.00 mark, slipping it into the wallets of her parents without their suspicion. Minimum wage at that time was $5.15 an hour, so she was sure her ma and pa knew something was up when they suddenly had much more money than they realized. Yet neither brought it up. Maybe they were too catholic to be logical, thinking it was a gift from God and his angels. But Ryan was sure her parents hadn't been that absorbed by some fake folk-lore, right?

Now, Ryan was a smart girl, ever since she was young. She could tie her shoes faster than others, knew the multiplication table before she even started learning about addition in school. Her ma taught her well and quick, made sure her daughter was always ahead of the learning curve because she knew that education was important. But as she had more kids and the weight of burden and necessity became too large, her ma was forced to quit the time she spent with each child, unable to keep teaching them things they wouldn't need to know for a few more years. Instead, she focused on working and bringing in money, while Ryan became engrossed in the technology her father had gotten her for her tenth birthday.

Computers were rare in those times. They were still a developing thing, something she was so unused to seeing. Only a few people in their tiny town had computers, and she was one of them, courtesy of her pa.

It was a big thing, that computer, all square and clunky. Sometimes it would turn itself off for no reason, sometimes it would move as slow as a turtle. It agitated her sometimes, the way it refused to respond, how it would stop everything all together and sort of retreat in fear.

So she fixed it. She fiddled around, went onto things and learned its language. Programming became her life. By the time she was twelve, she had it all figured out. Even the new languages that were made for the newer computers were in her mind, she could manipulate them.

The year she turned thirteen her pa bought her a newer, more advanced computer. She hugged and kissed him every day for a year straight because of it; that computer was her baby. It moved quicker than her old one, superior in every form of the word.

Her eldest sibling – Mark, only ten at that time – pestered her. He kept saying he wanted to use it, but never would she let him. No, she was too engrossed in the lines of text she entered on the screen to allow him to ruin it. All those programs she created could never be destroyed, but she didn't want to risk the chance.

It was when she turned fourteen that she knew of the world wide web. She went on blogs and sites dedicated to the thing she loved - codes. And then one man changed her life.

He talked to her like they were friends, a bond formed in the hidden lines of the internet. Their trust grew as they conversed about the language of computers, and soon enough he introduced her to the world of hacking. If she could do one task for him, he'd allow her into the cyber club filled with people like themselves, people engrossed with the codes.

So she did it. She hacked a site and sent it to its death, used her commands to decimate it.

She didn't know the consequences of her actions, wouldn't know how many people it affected until it was on the news and she was hiding her IP address from the world.

But what did she care, at that moment? She had been welcomed into that cyber gang with the highest of respect; what she did was talent; what she did was skill.

It only took her a matter of months to overthrow every huge website built, a few more to become the leader of that cyber crew. She led those masked people on with a head of power, knowing what she could do and glad that she could do it.

So when she was sixteen and needed to get out of school to help her ma and pa – the two people she loved the most – she hacked the state's school's system. Made it so she was always there; her parents were never the wiser. She gave herself great marks in all her classes, made sure no one reported that she wasn't present; she made herself a ghost.

It was a great plan, until they caught on. But it was too late - she was seventeen, on the cusp of her eighteenth birthday. Only a few more months and she'd be out of that catholic town with its catholic people and the God she had never believed in.

When that doorbell rang and her pa answered the door, she was positive it was a representative from her school. She had been found out, she'd have to quit her job, she'd have to wise up and admit her faults.

But the wetness in her ma's eyes made her realize otherwise. A visit from the school wouldn't cause her pa to look at her with such sadness, wouldn't cause her ma to be tearing up like she was.

Then in walked a man in uniform, stars on his shoulders from years of service, a badge in his hand with government clearance. A military man, she thought at first, with all his medals of achievements hanging on his breast.

"Ryan Henderson," he stated as he approached her.

And she'll never forget what happened next, no matter how many lives she lived.

"By order of the president of the United States, you're under arrest."

Oh, Lord, she had never seen a catholic town pray so hard in her life.

…

In handcuffs she listened as they read her rights and spoke kindly to her, like a sheep being lead to slaughter. She can't recall how long they drove, or how long the plane ride had been. It was a special plane, seating just herself and the two military officers she came to know as Joe and Terrance. Whether those were their real names or not, she didn't care; it was what they were called by her.

Joe had been the one who entered her house, Terrance had been the one who drove the car. They were good people, she figured, men of servitude. Now, they didn't serve a God, she knew. Their deity was real, you could see him – the President of the United was as real as Joe or Terrance or herself. Even if she only saw him on the TV screen every once in a while, she knew he was someone you could touch with your hands, see with your eyes, hear with your ears.

So when they asked her to be a government hired worker, under the rule of the President, she agreed. The choice wasn't even given, really; between a job and jail, it was obvious which any normal person would choose.

Joe was the one who told her of what had happened. They saw her hacking, seen how easily she had gotten through every firewall, every encodement. He even mentioned her once-upon-a-time attack on the Pentagon's system, trying to be stern but failing to hide the admiration in his voice. She had gotten through their defences, she remembers with that arrogant smile she still uses, but she hadn't touched a thing. Just left a warning to up their security and got out with no detection.

She questioned how they knew, asked how they caught her.

"Some detective found you out. Said there was a moment where your IP address wasn't changed."

And she knew instantly who she had to blame for her arrest.

That silly brother of hers had gone on it, hadn't he? 14 year old Mark had caused the four year servitude of 17-almost-18 year old Ryan.

Not like she minded.

Nah, she enjoyed the challenges they gave her; it was like a game.

"Get into Russia's system, but don't get caught."

"Make sure China isn't planning anything, but don't get caught."

"Canada is doing some sneaky business, check up with them. Don't get caught."

She never got caught.

She was the best at what she did.

Even as the languages advanced, even as she received the newest computers and the hardest tasks, she finished them with ease.

And her ma and pa forgave her, said the Lord did, too. But she didn't need the forgiveness of no imaginary man, yet she pretended she did. She faked tears on the phone, said she was so happy she found the wrong in her ways and repented.

She lied so they would accept the money she wired to their accounts.

…

When she was 22 they released her from her contract, considered her a free woman after finishing her sentence of servitude. She up and left that country the instant she was free. Like hell she was returning to that life, no matter how much she enjoyed the challenge. She wasn't going back to no catholic town with their catholic people and the God she long ago forgot about. She wasn't going to stay in that country, just waiting for some big thing to hit and call her back to help. She wasn't going to help none of those people again, not as long as she could help it.

So she left for a while, first to London, then to Amsterdam. For a while she spent her time exploring India and China, then finally settled in Japan.

She wired money to her parents to keep her siblings in good hands. Little Mark was not so little anymore, becoming a man at 18 years of age. He worked their fields and stayed a servant of God, forcing their sister, little lady Mary, to keep to the ways of the Lord, even after her sixteenth birthday. Mary still went to school; she was a good girl, real smart and everything. Did all she could so her ma and pa wouldn't need another trip to the hospital like her ma did years ago, a year after Ryan was gone. She was the one in charge of keeping the youngest child, sweet boy Anthony, five at the time, in line and well.

They were still a catholic little family in a catholic little town.

But Ryan wasn't. Ryan knew she wouldn't be welcomed back with open arms in that family if she went back. She cussed, she liked to smoke and drink. She had engaged in physical intercourse before marriage with Terrance one year on a drunken impulse, and now she was not worthy under the eye of God, was she?

Nah, she wasn't, but the President? She was worthy to the President.

She'd some day be worthy to someone else, too.

She had no use of a catholic little town.


	2. Shut Your Mouth

When the Kira crisis broke out, she had been in Japan for only a few months. Everyone knew she was a foreigner, from her strawberry blond hair and the amber of her eyes, to the even tone of her skin, no longer easily burnt after hardening it against the sun in Texas, good ol' Texas.

Maybe the Japanese folks thought she was Kira – the name _had_ originated from the English word 'killer', hadn't it? – and from the looks she received from passing citizens on the street, she assumed that was the case.

She can still recall the day she became interested in the whole crisis, the day she began making her presence noticed instead of hiding in the shadows like she had done since her arrival in the island country.

If the condescending assumptions of the citizens didn't give her enough reason to prove she wasn't the infamous killer, then it was certainly because she saw that broadcast.

From that man.

L.

He interested her. She had never seen a man that clever, that ruthless. He had a man murdered on live television just to taunt Kira to come out to play. He revealed his plan to those who were watching to make his prey feel small and ashamed after he fell into it. That man was cruel.

He was Godless.

So she became an identity of her own. The skills she learned working as a government official, the things she had learned from doing the occasional small hacking-job on the side while in Japan, the information she had gathered from breaking into the files of the divisional police team set on the case... Everything she had done played a part, created her solid background in the fight against Kira.

But then someone grew anxious. It was a man who had been watching her for weeks and weeks, someone she knew the presence of but ignored because she thought he was no man of action. She knew he was hostile, knew that man watched her with angry, accusing eyes, but knew she could take him.

He approached her on her walk home, in the middle of an abandoned parking lot where her truck was parked. Held a knife in his hand, stared at her with nothing but disgust.

"You're Kira," he stated without remorse. It was something she respected, that tone he used. He wasn't weak, but his stupid assumption discredited any respect he had gained from her with that discovery. "You killed my wife!"

"Funny," she responded, and gave that smug grin that consistently got her in trouble, "Kira only kills criminals. Your wife must have been a bad, bad woman, hm?"

Ryan never cared who she hurt with her words. She had no God to please; she had no rules to follow, no limitations on what she could and could not do. She didn't care for petty things like denying or acknowledging when people accused her of things. There was no need for a "yes" or "no", or even a futile refusal of being the killer he claimed she was. She knew there was no changing an opinion, no creating a false set of truth to bring denial to something you thought to be reality. He believed she was Kira, and that was it.

So when he rushed her with tears in his eyes, she did not hesitate for a moment.

She raised that gun from her side, shot him – once, twice – watched mercilessly as he fell to the ground, his frantic eyes wide, a bullet in his brain, another to his heart.

Years and years of seeing reports of dead men, of hacking in and discovering plans of mass genocide, of being secluded and alone, had made her hardened. She was a government employee, at one point. She thought in forms of numbers and crooked moralities - She was not a child of God.

Ryan didn't let the nameless man bleed out, she did not leave him there. No, she piled his dead body into the back of her truck bed without a thought, covered it with a tarp, drove to her cabin a little ways out of the city.

And she dug a hole, put the man in it after catching his name – Hashiro Ryuu – and burying him.

 _No, pa, we ain't._

She wasn't a coward.

She would kill if she needed to, if that's what it took to stay alive. No man threatened her, even Kira didn't scare her, though he should have.

Though he eventually would have.

…

It's a day like any other, and her hands are quick against the keyboard of her laptop. Looking down at the sleek design of the Apple computer before her, she sighs. Damn, times have changed. Her first time, they had been large, booming keys on a computer barely able to keep up with her nimble digits. But now that computer was able to obey and fulfill in the matter of seconds. And how small they now were! Just amazing.

A week had past since she had buried her latest victim. She was not afraid of being found out for murder, never. She walked around with her held high like usual, still visited the cafe she frequented daily, still ordered her medium vanilla latte with a shot of espresso. The only thing different in her life was the empty space where a man had once followed.

You see, she made him disappear from the world. She hacked the government files like she always used to, deleted every record of a Hashiro Ryuu that may have ever existed. He was an unremarkable man with nothing special to make him noticed – the job had been done in the matter of hours. She wasn't worried, despite knowing the cold truth of it all: Even if she deleted a man from existence within a computer, within the most well-kept files, she could not erase the memories – the files – inside people. Ryuu would be remembered by those who knew him, they would wonder where he was, and one day he may be discovered. But by then she would be long gone, with a new identity, a new cover story. This was a game she was used to; it was a game she played well.

So she destroyed her truck, burnt it to bits in the middle of nowhere, walked hours from her second home to get back to Tokyo. She sold her cabin to the government for a future building site. It didn't bother her if they dug it up, found the body; the name it was under had been fake, someone she created out of her head and forced into the system. Everything about her existence was a scam. Working with the government for so long, she learned it was safer to be a lie then a truth.

In her mind, she remembers what she had once told her pa over the phone as he questioned her on things she was unable to answer, working for the President.

 _You know, pa, a man with no secrets is no man to be trusted._

…

Since the day she had seen that broadcast, seen the relentlessness of the one everyone called L, she had spent her days attempting to find his source. She wanted to hack in, get his attention, attain everything he knew. She found out small bits of useful information from the Japanese task force she had hacked, but it wasn't enough. It was just an inkling that narrowed her search down to a few million sources.

Sometimes, she missed the days where computers weren't widely used, where she could be in and out of a computer with the easiest form of effort in such record time.

In the middle of writing a code to narrow down the search, a joyous tone rang through her speakers. Exiting her program, she stared at the screen, at the usual Skype pop-up that became her only form of distraction nowadays.

Moving her laptop's cursor over the accept button, she saw the picture of her family pop to her screen, a moving image as their webcam activated. Hers quickly followed after, showing them her appearance.

"Ah, Ryan!" her ma said in a joyous tone, speaking her English with the southern drawl Ryan still possessed, even being in Japan. "You look gorgeous, my girl. You curled your hair today?"

Unconsciously, Ryan reached to her blond locks, all well-done in loose romantic curls. Shit, she forgot she had done that when she went to the club last night...

"Yeah, decided to try something different, ma," she lied with that arrogant little smile, speaking the Texas-touched English instead of the Japanese she was becoming accustomed to.

"It looks good, Ryan. You look real good! Caught yourself a man yet? Ya gonna bring him back to us?"

Ryan laughed, shook her head, but it was forced. Her ma always asked that question whenever they Skyped, always feeling the need to get into her love life. She could almost hear it coming, her ma sighing like she always did before saying, _I want some grandkids, y'hear?_

"Naw, ma. Not yet."

And then there it was, her ma's sigh, shortly followed by the signature, "I want some grandkids, y'hear?"

"I know, ma. I just haven't found no boy I wanna marry yet."

"Oh, I know, love. You know the Lord has someone for you out there, right? The Lord knows you, he'll take care of ya, my girl."

Inwardly, Ryan cringed. Lord this, Lord that, it was all her ma seemed to mention. But to them, their God was their saviour, and Ryan was still a catholic girl; she doesn't cuss, she doesn't smoke or drink alcohol. She hasn't had sex with a man, not until marriage like the bible says.

"Yeah, ma, I know. I'm waiting for that one to find me, I don't wanna go against the Lord's plan." She knew it was a gigantic lie, but she had become so good at lying, it came out almost on its own.

She could hear the excitement on the other side of the world, her laptop emitting the happy voices of siblings eager to speak to their eldest sister.

"Ma, is that Ryan? I wanna talk to her!" little Mary cried, rushing to the screen and standing behind her ma. God, Ryan thought, her sister was every bit as beautiful as she remembered her being when she grew up, only being able to see that little girl grow to be eleven before the rest of her was seen only through computer screens and pixels. Her hair was short and sun-bleached a striking blond, skin tanned with freckles on her face like a normal country girl, yet she possessed a beauty that captivated and charmed, but did not blind. Her sister was beautiful, she'd have no problem finding a man when she grew up. And one day she'd marry that man, and have that physical intercourse... "Hey, sis! How's life there?"

Ryan gave her cocky grin once more, shrugging, moving herself out of the frame to show the spectacular sight of Japan's center area. In the early morning, the city was bustling with sound and motion. It was much different from that tiny town she once lived in. "Ah, you know, it ain't really too glamorous or nothin'. Just some lights and some stuff. No different from home."

"Ah, don't lie, sis!" Even Mary's laugh was cute and attractive. It made Ryan smile with fondness. Yeah, she loved her siblings despite not being there as much as she should have been. It was a different kind of a love, a supportive, back-level love, such as she imagines a teacher might feel for her most fond pupil. Ryan watched as her ma waved her goodbye and allowed Mary to sit in the chair before the computer, becoming the center of her laptop screen. "So how's work going, huh?"

"It's..." She paused, thinking on how to answer. She _had_ become closer to figuring out what address belonged to L, but she was still so far away... "Goin' places. Still got a bit of work to do, but it'll get there." She sighs then, shakes her head. "How's school goin', kid?"

At that her sister's face lights up brighter than it already was, and she rambles on and on about things only they two speak about, such as the town boy Mary has been in love with since her fourteenth year, the boy who – apparently – she is going to go out with a week from then.

"And I think, sis, that I'm gonna kis-" Mary began to say, only to be cut off by the rough and tough voice of the eldest of the three still at home.

"Let me talk to Ryan, kid," it says as a toned body stands in front of the webcam, nothing but a tanktop covering up the man's torso. Despite being his sister, Ryan could never help but think he was gorgeous. They talk often, more than anyone else in their family, she and Mark. He told her everything, like how all them catholic girls in town wanted to marry him, how they all hoped he'd put a ring on their finger and let them have his children – Lord knew all they wanted was his Texas-toned body and southern charm.

In the privacy of his truck – which, as she could see by the blurring scenario from the webcam on their end, he was going to – they spoke of darker things, like how he was losing faith in their god, how he didn't want no marriage, how he longed for something more meaningful than a farm boy's chores.

"Hey," he says after propping the laptop up on the dashboard on his car, reclining the passenger seat so his face was in the frame. He was a gorgeous boy, with a strong jaw, kind, stern eyes like she remembers Joe had, the scruff of a beard poking its way out around his lips, giving him a manly look to him, though he was all country boy.

"Hey," she responds, nodding slightly in acknowledgment.

"Uh, how are ya, sis?"

"You know." She shrugs, closes her eyes as she does. "Survivin'. How're you holdin' up there?"

"'Bout the same." For a brief second there's a laugh, a pathetic little attempt at humour, though all Ryan can hear is the sadness kept within it; it's deprived of anything joyful, almost painful. She doesn't question him about it, instead just waiting patiently until he thinks it's alright to talk. "So, I've been really thinkin' 'bout things, sis. I think... I think I wanna join the army."

"Naw," comes her swift response. "You ain't gonna do nothin' like that, boy. You're gonna stay in that town and take care of ma and pa, y'hear?"

She sees the anger in his face before she hears it in his voice, but she knows it's misdirected. He's not angry at her words; he's angry 'cause she's right. "But...! Ryan, you can't think to keep me here! I'm like you, I ain't got a God no more!"

"You ain't _nothin'_ like me, Mark. Don't ever say nothing like that again." And she realizes she's more mad than she should be by the tone of her voice as it leaves her lips. With a shake of her head, she silences any words bound to exit her mouth, tries to soften her expression, and continues. "You gotta do what I can't, a'ight? Ma and pa rely on you to help 'em, more than you know."

"But they have _your_ money, you and 'em don't need another expense!"

"You shut your mouth," she exclaims, just a little too loud, turning heads of those already curious of her foreignness. Lowering her voice and disregarding their scowls, she continues, "I got more money then I know what to do with, so ya'll just shut up and live well, a'ight? I ain't wanna hear any of this talk again, understood?"

There's a long moment of silence between them, and she sees his eyes fill and empty of anger in seconds, avoiding them from hers on the screen.

"Yes, ma'am."

Then the connection ends.

With a sigh, she collapses back into the chair, unaware that she had ever been sitting up straight in the first place.

Damn that brother of hers, making her react like that. Over the years they had kept in contact through video chats, once or twice a week, always checking in to make sure her latest amount of money made it to them, that they were doing alright without her there. She and Mark were closest of all the siblings; he was the only one in her family who knew she feared no God; who knew she smoke and drank and occasionally he heard her cuss (though she tried to avoid it in front of him, knowing the words were still too harsh for his catholic-raised ears).

For him to proclaim he wanted to join the army was absurd. That meant fighting, that meant the potential of death.

Like hell she was letting him do that to himself; she had seen too much firsthand herself to ever allow someone she loved to go through that type of harrowing.

Though, looking at the progression of things on her laptop, searching for L, she realized that what she was doing was no less dangerous as what he wished to do.

Both events could lead to death.

Both were reckless and frightening, leading to so many unknown situations and variables.

But as her computer screen flashed up a list of three or four matching results, she realized they were different in only one way.

Her danger would happen; his would not.


	3. Good or Evil

When Ryan was thirteen, she started pushing the limits, trying things to see their outcomes. To the rest of the world, such actions were considered crimes. But to her, they were nothing more than harmless experiments.

Said experiments traditionally never had any positive outcome for any involved – including the culprit – but she didn't care; the lessons she learned were invaluable, and she was too clever to get caught by those who chased her; it had become too easy for her to hide herself, to take upon herself the identity of a ghost. Her digital footprints were never found, no signs or clues that would trace back to a living person capable of such elaborate cyber-crimes. Never would an officer suspect a child as young as she to accomplish such profound tasks, and embracing this disappearing act was how she had lived the majority of her teenage years (until the unfortunate events that led her to being caught at the cusp of her 18th year).

These experimental feats were invaluable to her; she learned how to wire money without a trace, taking small amounts from multiple accounts under the guise of 'fees'; she learned how to weaken firewalls by attacking codes of separate programs; how to create fake identities, complete with identification numbers and traceable histories that never actually happened. And, while scamming hundreds of dollars from people on a small-scale online poker site, she learned you could convince people of falsehoods with the right words, the right false-facts, the perfect lies.

Perhaps it was in those days of curiosity-driven experimentation that she first learned of humanity's cruelty, while closely questioning her own.

Perhaps it was when she was in government servitude, given the order to develop a program that would track and monitor search queries, able to manipulate and categorize the answers that were received by each, smart enough to classify threats and dangerous search patterns autonomously, with only the smallest margin of error. She had never allowed herself to imagine what the government was to use her technology for, for she knew by this time that it would never be an answer she liked, nor one she could contest. Everything she had thus far done while in their captivity had been something considered unjust, corrupt, or immoral by the general public, but all lead to keeping the peace and safety of those who threw such accusations around. They would denounce it with the little knowledge they possessed of its intention, but if they knew the events the system had prematurely ended, they would be praising it endlessly, instead.

Maybe it was before that ever happened, before she had been held as a criminal under federal law. Maybe the knowledge came years ago, when she was fourteen, calming after knocking out the boy who relentlessly bullied her younger brother and receiving the harsh reprimand of her parents. Though she had done the right thing in her eyes, it was an awful route to take in the opinions of others. Yet those who judged did not know: the boy had been a menace, with a wild rage he so often directed on the weak and young in an attempt to exercise the control he thought he had, never being challenged before by the small. He had deserved the stitches for his actions; she did not deserve the sermon for hers.

Either way, she grew to know of the reality of the world, that there were no 'good people' or good acts, just directionless people with different levels of self-righteous ideals, all with different levels of self-preservation. People would do what they thought correct and just regardless of whether it actually was, executing these acts because they believed it to be helpful and humane to themselves or others. But sometimes it was not, sometimes it was what others considered evil, sometimes it involved matters that most preferred to avoid.

This reasoning in her mind was only further solidified when she went to the government, and witnessed testimonials – and events – firsthand.

On those days where she would be kept in a little room, forced to do the codes she had previously done thousands of times before to check their Pentagon security, she would converse with her guard. Sometimes it would be Joe – whose name was not even Joe, she found later on, but rather Nicholas, though she was not in the habit of using that name – and other times it would be a nameless person with little to say, but just as many medals on his chest.

One time, she recalls, there had been a man she won't ever be able to forget.

He said his name was George, and he was part of the Secret Service. He was at least fifty, well-versed in the ways of war and the bible, though he never seemed to preach and hardly showed his holy side, despite having a few holes put in him by enemy guns.

 _You're raised never to harm a person. The law tells you murder is a sin, and so does the bible. But when you join the army, they tell you the opposite. You're trained to kill, and it's all alright in the eyes of the Lord if you do._

She remembers him saying that, and it was what finalized her idea of human morality. She was 20 at the time, still young but no longer impressionable; she had seen too much in her then-two-year service to be blinded to the truth. She had pretended not to care when he spoke of his experiences in war and morality, but she loved the topic; people were so twisted, so Godless, and she loved learning what they would do to protect their ideals of right and wrong, just how unconsciously corrupt they really were. So she lit a cigarette, allowed the gray haze she exhaled to fill the room as he explained on.

 _Soon as you join the army, you're taught that people aren't equal, that our enemies are worth less than normal people so it's not considered a sin if you end their life. There's different cases, you know, on when to kill._

A few more puffs, she remembered, then she put out the first cigarette and lit another. Smoking was always something she did to think, and he was causing her to do that a lot with his words, the topic they spoke of being far more addicting then the nicotine.

 _But you do it anyways, shoot them. It's no longer a matter of what's good, because you're doing what is considered moral, what you gotta do to stay alive. On the battlefield, who cares who's right or wrong, right? It's kill or be killed, there isn't time to think about them or the family you're tearing them away from. It's just about you, and the family that you got at home, and them, the terrorists threatening to bomb them. It's... savage. Everything the Lord stands for is invalid in war._

She put out her second cigarette then, looked over her computer at him, no one and nothing else in that empty room but they and the mechanical machine she called her only friend. She remembers that look in his eyes, that thousand-mile stare she had seen a thousand times on the other vets who had guarded her. She remembers the flash of pity she saw on his face, as she recalls saying: "There ain't nothing good or evil in life, just circumstances."

He gave a sort of defeated sigh then, like he hadn't wanted to have her confirm a similar thought in his head.

 _You've grown up too fast._

…

It took her exactly 17 hours and 34 minutes to break into his system. It was a grueling task, and she had no sleep throughout it. The firewalls, encryption, and overall protection proved difficult. If she were a normal hacker (or a normal person, for that matter) with little form of determination and pride, she would have given up well into the seventh hour; it had seemed the strongest at that point, when all the cards had been played and the money off the table in L's victory. If it wasn't for the constant need to prove herself, to just _get in,_ she would have given up already, too.

But she knew how the game went, she had played it too well and too often. You'd reach a point where you thought you were losing, but you'd type a different code, and suddenly the battle was evened. Then another code, and another, and progressively you were headlong to completion, to access. Sometimes, the duration of each stage was elongated, but it was always how it went. Or, at least, for her.

When she had gained the entry, though, it was as if she were at a loss.

It was different, now. Ryan never had the need to think beyond, "get in". That had always been her goal when she was younger, never thinking of what else she needed or should do once said goal was met, because there was always another task afterwards to follow. It had always been laid out for her, the ways to proceed. The government had been specific and unwavering on exactly what needed to be done; they already had an agenda set up to follow, and as such, so did she. With a self-depreciating smile, she realizes she is more like the computers themselves than she realizes; without the next code or command to follow, both she and the machine come to a screeching halt.

What was it she was wanting out of this rebellious act? For a while she just stared at her computer screen with full access to the detective's deepest files. She saw as they were labeled: Closed cases, Previous cases, Potential cases, Kira case.

Kira case, yes. That's what had started everything, that one case with that flamboyant show of aggression from L. L, that man she was interested in, the one she wanted to meet if only just to confirm her beliefs that he was a Godless being, a man without a hope of heaven, without remorse. For the moment, that was her next task – Meet him.

And in order to do that, she had to get his attention.

...

She had given herself two days to prepare for the grand event.

Her contingency plans were set up and sleeping for the time being. By doing this prep, she realized what she was giving up, what she was risking, and what she was losing. By doing this, one of two things could immediately happen: either he would meet her and listen to her, or he would kill her at the first chance. The options did not worry her, nor did it scare her by any means – death had been something she had seen often in the four years she served the President, and had been something she had frequently dabbled with in the few short months after her final release. Death, and the irreversibility of it, was almost welcoming, though she would never outwardly say it.

It was not that she felt suicidal, but neither would she flinch from an inevitable death. She was minutely aware of her responsibilities to her family, their financial support and the crushing heartbreak her passing would cause them, but even this was not enough to dissuade her from her course of action. Two days had been long enough to ensure that, should anything happen to her, they were properly taken care of, and courses of action taken to prevent their agony for as long as possible. Two days had been all she had allowed herself to prepare for a death she was almost anticipating to happen.

It was a meeting she was almost sure he wouldn't come to, at least not himself.

Her message was vague, but straight to the point. It would take no effort to understand it's meaning, it's threat, especially if he was as smart as the media claimed the detective was.

So she sat, in her usual spot in metropolitan Tokyo, at the same coffee spot she frequented every day. Today, she carried with her a book instead of her usual laptop, careful to avoid too much resemblance to the image she imagined L would be searching for. Not to make herself _too_ inconspicuous, though, she made sure to order her regular vanilla latte, and treated herself to one of their pastries. Realizing after she took her fist bite that this could be her last meal, she almost regretted picking the lemon loaf over some of the more fattening, sugar-filled items.

Enjoying the somewhat disappointing dessert, she sighed.

Now all she had to do was wait.

...

She had been about forty minutes into reading her novel when it finally happened.

The message she had left on L's computer had only a few details: A time, a place, and a drink, though the threat was clearly felt in her words. The drink she listed was finally ordered, after only 40 minutes of waiting, to a person she did not expect at all.

The representative (for this could not be L himself, could it?!) was tall, and stood with superior posture. He had the appearance of youth, but fine lines near his eyes and mouth showed his age at being mid 30s, perhaps older if she were judging by the awful scowl lines on his forehead. His hair was dark and well-kept, his attire as tidy as his hair. He wore a typical business work suit, almost identical to the many other office workers here during their lunch hour, the order he placed with the barista the only hint given that he was not what he seemed to be.

"May I get a large, light whip, triple espresso shot skinny vanilla latte, please?" his baritone voice politely asked, and at this time she made a large effort to avoid looking at him entirely, pretending to be engrossed in her reading. She must make no notice of him due to the order itself, not yet.

Ryan sat parallel to the pick up counter, acutely aware of his presence a few feet away from herself as he waited, but making no out of place motion to draw his attention to her. Instead, she took a sip of her latte, flipped the page of her novel and continued to read as if nothing had happened. He stood, examining the area without haste or urgency, drawing no unwanted attention to himself, either. It seemed they had both played this game before, both aware of the rules and the need for confidentiality.

But Ryan was never one to play by the rules.

As soon as the mystery man received his drink, he was approached by a girl who was not she, but who, as well, was there to meet that same man, with the same drink order.

"Excuse me, but I think you're who I'm here to meet, from the computer," the young woman timidly admitted, avoiding her large brown eyes from his narrowing grey ones. Ryan had given the scene a quick glance when the girl approached, as seemed normal from a regular customer in a busy cafe with people in close proximity to one another. She noticed the girl's extreme happiness at her luck of a beautiful companion, and the extreme confusion of the man himself. It took everything in her to suppress her giggle, as this was such a serious turning point for the task at hand and she must keep her cool; she had reason to remain cautious, even if the beautiful man truly was L.

Ryan continued to ignore them, continuing in her book but remaining aware of their presence, even as they moved to sit down at a table across the room. It did not matter that she couldn't hear the conversation itself – she wasn't interested in the words so much as the actions he made. This would determine how it played out, if she met him or not. She had given herself two days to orchestrate the event, because although she was eager to meet L, she certainly was not going to be reckless, not just yet.

Looking over the brim of her book, she could examine the two people without looking like she was staring. She watched as the lady spoke animatedly to a man who did not slack in his stiff posture, on guard and keeping it up despite the friendly tone of his companion's voice.

For a few minutes the woman's excited chatter droned on, but Ryan imagined it must have felt like hours to the man. And just like that, Ryan knew it was not L. It could not be the man himself; it was a sit-in, a middle-man. This type of meeting was not what she wanted – if she were to meet him, it would be him and no one else, despite his hesitations of danger. It was no great surprise that this first meeting was a dud, as she had expected a certain amount of distrust. She knew these nervous feelings well, but – she reasoned – she didn't have Kira to fear around every corner, who seemed able to kill without a physical force. She did not take offence to this slight; in fact, she was glad of it; if he had been so stupid as to show his actual face in this type of establishment, with so many unknowns, she might not have wanted to work with him after all.

So finishing her latte, she stood from her seat, threw out the cup, and casually abandoned the man to his unfortunately talkative fate.


End file.
